A Whole New World
by LoyalAsAViking
Summary: Launa North's whole life fit in her back pocket, starving and alone she joined up with an abusive group of homeless and runaways called The Family. When things go south she does what she has always done. Runs. As the Beacon Hills town sign comes into view she pushes harder at the thought that she will survive the night but fate has different plans. WARNING! Contains Triggers.


The family. That's what we called each other, what the "parents" forced us to call each other. When you're homeless or a runaway you take love how ever you can get it. It didn't matter how old we were, that I was three years older than our "Mother", that our "Father" was a twenty-five year old man, three years older than myself. If we wanted to eat, when we got to eat, we had to thank our parents.

"Thank you mom for loving me when no one else will. Thank you dad for protecting me like no one else can." I pushed myself through those words every time, gritting my teeth till my jaw ached. All for a handful of stale McDonalds fries and one small gulp from a grimy overused plastic cup full of dirty water mixed with a couple shakes from an old Kool-Aid pouch?

I learned the hard way to keep all my valuables on my person at all times, and if I didn't want to get jacked I had to sleep with one eye open. I was twenty-two years old, I had my divers license, social security card, birth certificate and three dollars to my name. My whole existence fit into the back pocket of my ripped jeans and every morning I woke up I had to force myself to think of anything other than ending my own life.

The family had two rules.

"Respect your mother and father."

"All money collected is given to your father so he can provide for your brothers and sisters."

They were written on the abandoned warehouses front door, reminding you every time you went outside. There was only one punishment for disobeying the rules.

Death. As extreme as it was, it was always enforced. I had thought it was a joke at first. Who would kills someone for something so small?

That was why I was running. I watched the family beat a boy to death for keeping 75cents. The 75 cents I gave him to keep so that he could call his mom, so he could go home. I don't blame him for telling the family that I gave him the money, they had beat him within an inch of his life but it put me in the same position. Running for my life.

The parents had a car, a jeep really, that was how they got around from town to town stealing and begging for money, I use to envy that car, now that they were chasing me down however, I hated the fucking thing.

When I passed the Beacon Hills town sign I was already out of breath and shaking, it didn't help that they were playing with me. Going only fast enough so that I would keep running but not fast enough to hit me. Those sick people I had spent that past five months with were had me stuck in their sick game of cat and mouse.

I only needed to make it to the town, I could see the street lights in the distance. I could hide inside of a shop until morning then I can go to the police tell them what I saw, I needed to get Jamie's body to his mother, I owed him that much.

"Where you going Lil Red?" I hear the family shouting from the windows, getting closer and closer, pushing me to run harder when all I want to do is stop.

So without much thinking, I do.

I stop.

I take one large lungful of air as the car rushed past me. I can feel side mirror barely brush against my shoulder. I don't wait for them to notice I'm no longer in front of them, I don't wait to see if they turn around. I don't know where I plan on going I just turn to my right and run for the woods. Hoping that the close nit trees will help hide me and stop them from using their car.

By the time I reach the tree line they're already coming for me and I'm already out of breath. I don't know how much longer I'll be able to keep this up and for the first time since I joined their little family I realize that I want to live.

"At least for tonight. At least until morning." I huff out hiding behind one of the larger trees to catch my breath. I try to slow myself down, to not breathe in so loud but I cant help myself. I can only hope that my need to breathe doesn't betray me.

The bright head lights flood the forest and I know that if I dare even move a finger my shadow will betray me. I hear the slam of the car door and I have to force myself not to look back and see what's happening.

"Oh Lil Red! Come out, come out where ever you are." I hear the fathers deep voice call out. I know he is going to kill me, I can feel it like a rock in the pit of my stomach. I force myself to hold my breath, the last thing my body wants to do, when I hear the cracking of leaves and twigs. He is getting closer and closer.

"Turn on our little girls favorite song wont you Mama." I don't hear a reply only the start of the song I had always loved as a girl. They had thought it fit me perfectly when we had first met. My red hair and pale skin. I was forever Little Red Ridding Hood.

"Who's that I see walkin' in these woods? Why it's Little Red Ridin' Hood." My skin crawls as he sings along with the song, his voice is close enough to send whatever nerves I have left through the roof.

The song goes on drowning out his foot steps, making it impossible to track where he is. I feel myself going insane, their game is tearing my mind apart.

My heart stops when something large moves in the dark in front of me, for a moment I think its that evil man stalking me until I see the florescent blue eyes, watching me. I'm so focused on the eyes, so drawn in that I don't see him beside me. I don't hear him lean against the tree, I don't know he's there until I feel his breath on my neck. By then its to late, I know I've run out of time.

"Found you." He whispers, even though I know he's there it still makes me jump, my heart still leaps into my throat then drops to the pit of my stomach.

"I haven't had this much fun since I was a boy." The cold edge of his knife stings as he runs it behind my ear pressing harder as he makes his way to my neck. "I don't want it to end so soon. Lets give you a head start hmm."

I have to force myself to look at him, regretting it the moment I see his twisted smile.

"Better run from the big bad wolf lil girl." He laughs sticking his knife into the flesh above my hip, his free hand covering my scream before pushing me to the ground. I don't think, I just run. Blue eyes forgotten.

I don't know how I do it, my body is screaming at me to stop, that it cant take anymore but his fake howls urge my forward. I believe I'm far enough from him, I cant hear his laughs anymore. I want to believe he gave up that the chase wasn't what he thought it would be.

I'm slammed into the forest floor.

"You'll have to be quicker than that." His body is pressed against mine, forcing me into the ground. Hands everywhere touching things that would never belong to him. I'm helpless as he turns me over, fighting only until he presses his knife against my throat. His free hand grab at my shirt before slamming down hard against my chest in anger when he cant rip the fabric. The edge of his knife digs into my neck each time he tries and fails. His hands are shaking worse than my own.

"Is daddy having a hard time?" I sneer his name, mocking him. I know its not the best decision but I know without a shadow of a doubt that I'm going to die. I know this in my bones, I wont see the sun rise tomorrow.

"Fucking bitch" He growls forgetting my shirt and going straight to my pants, shoving his hand past the zipper and into my underwear. I try to clamp my thighs together to somehow force his hand from inside me. I fight against him, not caring about the knife at my throat.

He couldn't have me that way, I was no virgin but I wasn't going to be used. I clawed at his hands and face, tearing into anything I could get my nails into. I guess he didn't find raping me worth the fight anymore because before I could blink he removed the knife from my throat and pressed it against my stomach. He just presses it there and watches me.

Slower than I would have liked, he pressed harder against on the knife. At first it hurt. At first I could feel every inch sink into me, slower than the it was cold, just something foreign I could feel inside me. His smile never changed, his eyes stayed dark and full of lust. I wanted to rip his face off.

"You're tickling me." I laugh at him. I believe I've gone insane, that somewhere during their game I truly lost my mind.

Then he moved, he left the knife inside me and started to cut, he was carving into me. I know there was pain, it felt like I was being ripped open. Then there was the howling, it echoed through the forest and caused the man above me to lose his grip.

"Little red and a big bad wolf. Perfect." He was gone soon after, leaving me bleeding, dying. I was alone. I accepted my death even though not to long ago I realized I wanted to live. Fate was a cruel thing but maybe there was someone on the other side. Maybe there was peace.

I pushed myself back, reminding myself for a moment of the "crab crawl" we did in elementary school, until I hit a tree. I collapse against its strong roots no longer able to hold myself up. Pressing my face against its rough skin I tried to breathe and for the first time in this nightmare of a night,

I cried.

Maybe the blood loss was making me cold or maybe now that the adrenaline had worn out I was feeling how cold it really was out here but this tree felt warm, comforting to me as I bled over its roots.

"Sorry im making a mess all over you." My lips scrap across the bark, I don't mind the small spikes of pain, its nothing. I know real pain now.

Pressing my cheek into the rough warm bark I forced myself to breathe, it had become easier and easier not to, to drift into nothingness. I need to remember that old natural rhythm.

In and out. Again. In and out.

Alone and in the dark. I kept thinking that maybe if I just stayed alive until morning, someone would find me. I just needed to keep breathing. If I was talking I was breathing, right? Right?

"I use to want to be the Pink Power Ranger when I was a girl." I breathed against the roots. "I would play with my cousins, kicking the air and fighting invisible mutant... things." It seemed like such a huge deal now that I was slipping. These memories were all I had left and I just wanted to share them with someone. I wanted to be remembered even if it was by a tree.

"I remember my aunt, she was a loud thing, she got me some lipstick on one of my birthdays, I lost it the same day. I never told her, I didn't want to hurt her feelings. She didn't have a lot of money, none of us did."

Blue eyes watched me from the darkness, glowing bright. I wasn't afraid of them though, I was happy that I wouldn't be alone. I didn't want to be alone anymore.

"I wouldn't do things different. I would always end up right here, with you. My new best friends, Blue Eyes and some roots." I don't know why it was so funny, how I could find my death so joke worthy but I did and I laughed.

"No. I lied. I would love my brothers and sisters more. I would go back and tell them everyday how much I love them, I wouldn't be so mean or so quick to yell at them. I don't think they know that I really do love them." I had to close my eyes, they had just gotten so heavy. That didn't mean that I would fall asleep, I would live until the morning.

It almost felt like the roots cradled me, rocking me even. It soothed all my worries and took away my pain. I don't remember if I was still talking or not, I just kept thinking about my life and what I could have done. Is that what people mean when they say their life flashed before their eyes? If this is what death felt like, then maybe it wasn't so bad.

"Is it true that dead things help plants grow?" I asked the tree. "You being a plant and all, I could maybe help you grow big and strong. Like milk."

I forced my eyes open one last time, I wanted to see the stars. Instead I came face to face with what I could have only describe as my personal grim reaper. Blue eyes, hairy face, fanged mouth and all.

Yet I couldn't help but use what little strength I had left and touch him. My dripping hand panting his face red.

"Did you know..." I had to stop the catch what little breath I had left each word becoming harder and harder to form. "In the original Little Red Riding Hood, the wolf and the girl ate the grandma together?" My body buzzed in time with the roots cradling me.

I closed my eyes again and accepted that I wouldn't make it till tomorrow. I wouldn't make it another breath. I let go and I had never made a better decision in my entire life.


End file.
